Title: Challenging Professing Liberal “Christians”

Apologia Studios

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00:00

What's up, everybody? You have tuned in to another show of Provoked, and I'm here with my beautiful sister,

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Desi. You're very kind. And one of the best guys in the whole planet right here, Dennis Sarfate.

00:11

I thought you were gonna say I was the beautiful. Well, you are a good looking man, I wouldn't have to say. Hey, we're excited about today.

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You better bottle up, bottle up. Bottle up. You better buckle up, buttercups, because it's gonna be a wild one.

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We have a lot to say. It's just the season of being bold. It's the season for Christians that we can no longer take a back seat when these things have been pressed upon us in this nation.

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We have to rise up and just simply be the Christ followers that Jesus has called us to be. But what we want you to do right now is go to paulgistudios .com.

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That's A -P -O -L -O -G -I -A studios .com. Become an All Access member. Please do it.

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If you do it, we continue to do what we do. I mean, when you go to a ministry like Ligonier or whatever it may be, and you constantly receive,

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I think it's only appropriate to be able to give back to that ministry. Because so many people take, and that's great.

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I mean, we want to equip the saints. We want to help the people of God. That's why we do what we do. But we would just ask you to give back, to become a supporter so we can save more babies, reach people in various cults all around the world, get the gospel out, expand the kingdom.

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We just wanna do what Jesus has called and commanded us to do. How do you help us go there, become that All Access member so we can keep going, keep the lights on, keep the people paid, and expand all that Jesus has commanded us and called us specifically as a ministry to do?

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We're here as a ministry to provoke the church. Why should we be provoked,

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Des? Well, because we need to, you know, iron sharpens iron.

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We need each other to keep going because especially after weeks like this, when you get beaten down, we need each other.

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God gave us each other as a gift to stir each other onto good works. That's good, right.

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I mean, it's a command. It's provoking us something good. Kind of in the American evangelical church, they see it as not being nice.

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Like the primary calling for a Christian is just to be nice, to go along, to get along, to be nice so people can come to church and hear about Jesus and the gospel.

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But you don't see that within the framework of scripture, especially the apostles and disciples.

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There's not this niceness about them. They are going out into the public square.

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They're going out into the marketplace. They're confronting sin. They're bringing the gospel. They're making inroads and just plowing forward for the kingdom.

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And so provoking is this stirring up. It's an agitation of the person to get them to do what they're called to do.

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You see it in like the sports world. I mean, coaches, they're not necessarily nice.

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I mean, they're telling you this is what you need to do and they aren't calling you nice names when they're doing it. It's to get you to do what you need to do, to get you to operate in a level that you're gonna win, that you're gonna be effective with, right?

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Yeah, I mean, you're not gonna go and say, all right, guys, let's go out there and just try and win today. No, there's language.

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They're provoking you. They're firing you up internally. Not so much in baseball before a game because the game's so long and maybe in later innings, but football coaches, those guys are insane sometimes, how intense they are.

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I feel like the church has lost that. The evangelical church has lost that. It's 49 minutes and you're in and out of church on a

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Sunday and you go live about your life. So I think this is provoked as a good word. Yeah, it's a biblical word.

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Paul saw the idols all around him in Acts 17. He was provoked in his spirit and he said, I'm going to confront this idolatry with the word of God.

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It's bringing the gospel in confrontation with what's going out there in culture. And so that's what we're all about.

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But we got Dennis on the program and I'm so stoked you are on. You're on.

04:01

He's such a blessing. I want to talk a little bit about your life. Dennis Scott, I didn't know that was your real name.

04:06

Dennis Scott. Or Denise, as Jada would say when I'm in trouble. So you're, and correct me if I'm wrong,

04:14

I did a little bit of research, 1981. Yeah. So a couple of years younger than me. You guys are the same age.

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He's one year older than me. I'm 82. You're 82. Yeah, you're Jada's age, yeah. Me and Jada. Almost 40.

04:25

Yeah, me and Jada are like almost birthday twins. You recently retired American professional baseball pitcher for the

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Fukuoka Softbank Hawks of Nippon, or Nippon, it's

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Nippon, professional baseball. You also played for the Brewers, the Astros, the Orioles, and the

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Hiroshima Toyo Carp. Yep. And Saitama, I'm sorry,

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I'm trying to do it justice. All of those are the city's name and then what company they are. So it's the

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Fukuoka Softbank Hawks. So Softbank's a telecommunications. Toyo Carp is

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Mazda. And Saitama is the city.

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Seibu is like a train line and department store, like a Nordstrom. Oh, sweet. But not retired yet.

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Not retired yet. Not yet. Nope, I still have obligations to the team and I'm working through this injury, but yeah, those are the three teams in Japan.

05:25

Right on. So you became one of the greatest closers in MPB history. All of your success has really been in Japan.

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MPB records, most saves in a season, most by a foreign born pitcher. And as of this year, 234 career saves, our fourth most in the

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MPB history. You've been a three -time MPB All -Star, a three -time

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Pacific League saves leader, a five -time Japan Series champion, won the Japan Series Most Valuable Player Award.

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And did you ever get nervous in the bottom of the ninth in the World Series games over there?

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No, you never get nervous. It's a feeling that I can't explain and no one will ever understand going into that game when you know it's on the line, you're up one nothing and you walk the bases loaded and you get out of it and you're like, what just happened?

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But it's an adrenaline rush. You're emotional. I mean,

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I remember one time coming out of the tunnel in the ninth inning, going to get a save, a one run game. And I see

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Jada and the girl sitting in the first row and I'm so amped up. I started like tearing up as I'm heading to the mound and I'm like, clean it up.

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Like, you gotta get this out. But you have so much emotions going through you that you just easily sparked.

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Yeah. What's so crazy is I was watching the World Series with this guy over here and it's just so amazing that level of gameplay and you look at those guys and the cameras are right up on their faces.

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And I mean, this is the seventh game of the World Series, right? Or they won in seven or six?

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They won in six, right? But you look at the guys, there's no sweat coming off them. And I'm like, how were they capable in that degree of gameplay?

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I mean, you were talking about the biggest event in baseball to not sweat, to keep it together.

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It's just like such formidable minds and capability to focus, you know what

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I mean? Yeah, I mean, that just comes from years of playing. I mean, those guys are weeded out, right?

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The ones that can't handle the pressure don't make it to the big leagues or they might make one appearance and then they show you what they're worth and then they're gone.

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Those guys that are playing in those big games, they've been in those situations their whole life.

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And it's just, you give your best ability, the other team gives their best and the winner takes it.

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And if you don't, you come back the next year, you work harder. But it's an unbelievable experience to play for a championship at the end of a season where you're exhausted and all these different emotions and feelings.

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But for me, whenever I got done there, I always knew if I get these three outs, I get to go home tomorrow.

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So it was like, I'm getting these three outs. It's gonna happen. And that's all I thought about. Yeah, that's awesome.

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You got the Japan Series Most Valuable Player Award, won the Pacific League MVP Award, won the

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Matsutaro Shoriki. Shoriki Award. That's probably the greatest honor. I mean, you can win

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MVPs and there were many other guys well more deserving than I was that year.

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A few guys on my team, hitter -wise. That Shoriki Award was something that they pick as the heads of the

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MPB. Sadaharu Oh, who was like Babe Ruth of the Japan League. They give it to who had the most influence in Japan, in the country, not just in baseball, but in overall.

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Which when they told me I won that, I was like, wow, why did I win this? I had no idea. And then they broke it down.

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I was the only foreigner player ever to win it. I'm only the second player to ever win it next to Hideki Matsui.

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So I knew it was a big deal. And I went to the award ceremony that year. It was more than the

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MVP. I thought the MVP is the top of the top. That Shoriki Award, people were just like, you don't understand the honor it was.

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And I won it, which most of the time it's the manager. And I won it from my manager and I apologize to him, but he loved it.

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He was very happy for me. And those Japanese, they get prideful sometimes. And you take one of their awards that's usually given to them.

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I didn't know how to react, how it was gonna be taken by the rest of the fans and the players on my team, but man, they were just so happy for me.

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That's awesome. Especially in that culture, that's just built on honor. That's why it's so meaningful. But you know what

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I like about you the most is that you're a husband of a beautiful wife, Jada, and beautiful three daughters.

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Very lucky. And you haven't let your great success and your accomplishments corrupt you.

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That's what I like about you so much. I think it's rare to see a man who has achieved a lot.

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From a worldly perspective, and of course done well. And you haven't allowed the success to pull your mind away from the kingdom.

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You haven't allowed it to conflate who you know you are according to how God sees you and the rest of the world, or maybe the kingdom sees you.

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And that's what I like about you the most. But you know as well as I know when it comes to the professional sports world, a lot of guys, they don't go that route.

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They let the money come in, they let the success, they let the fanfare, especially in Japan. You can't even walk down the streets of Japan without being noticed, right?

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Yeah, but you know, I was that guy. I was that corrupted fool that you see in movies and bad clips that you're like, oh, another typical athlete, right?

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Jada hated me when she first met me. Really? And she'll admit it. She'll tell you, you were awful. I was a womanizer,

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I didn't care, I was arrogant. Listen, you go out in Scottsdale, Arizona at 23 years old, you walk in with five guys that are 6 '4", athletic builds, everyone knows why you're there.

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They know you play baseball, you're handed everything, free drinks, you get to go in the back door.

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And so you live in this fake reality and it starts to catch up with you. You start hanging out with guys who are making well more money than you are.

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You know, I'm talking hanging out with guys that were making 15, $20 million a year. And I was making league minimum, but I felt

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I was up there with them. So I'm living this, you know, just fantasy land.

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And, you know, when I went to Japan and God saved me, I realized like, what was I doing? Like all these years spent just in debauchery, you know?

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And just like, what a fool I was. I still look back and I'm just like, man, I wish I didn't do this.

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I wish I would have changed this, but God had it all planned out and he knew what he was doing. And I think he used that to show me like, yeah, you are saved because what you were was awful.

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Now you're better. That's awesome. Well, the Bible says when regeneration happens, when it gives you that new heart, the old things pass away, behold, all things become new.

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So I'm just thankful right now, you're using your influence, you're using your gifting, you're using you to do good.

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I mean, you know, thousands of babies would be dead without you, without you, without Jada, without the ministry, and that you're so, you know, so just an integral part of all of what's going on.

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So I just appreciate that you knew who you once were, but now God's changing you. You're really, I think, setting a necessary example for people who are successful and tend to run to comfort and ease, which is so easy to do, right?

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It's so easy to go to comfort and ease and just set yourself up with whatever, you know, suits your fancy and not live a sacrificial life for the kingdom or for anybody around you.

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But I feel as though you do that. And I'm thankful for that. Thank you. Not perfectly. Yeah, no, absolutely not.

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We're praising God and I'm giving you no glory, but I think a lot of people who are successful in the world's understanding, the world's maybe definition of that need to see someone like you, right?

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Yeah, I mean, you gotta think about it. I go back to when I played in the States and I was a professing

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Catholic, a believer, I would say I was a believer, but like what you said yesterday resonated with me because if you,

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I didn't pass the limit. If you had asked me one question about the gospel, I wouldn't have not known nothing. I had

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Christian teammates never share the gospel with me, never talk to me about it.

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It was a thing, you went to the field, you did your work, you went home. And I feel like more athletes, more

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Christian athletes need to take charge in the clubhouse, whether you're basketball, football, baseball, gymnastics, whatever it is, you gotta speak the gospel and speak truth into it.

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And I feel like that's where the failures have come from the athlete's perspective of Christian athletes.

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There's been a lot of failures in that. A lot of guys that look just like me claiming to be Christians and they were doing the same thing

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I was doing. I was just like, well, why do I need Jesus? You're claiming, you know Jesus, we're going to chapel on Sundays.

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And then five days in a row, I'm seeing you do the same thing I'm doing. Is this just a good luck charm? Because I'm in if that's it.

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So I started going like a fool and like, maybe if I go on Sunday to chapel, I'm gonna do really well that night.

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And it's like, you're living in this fake world that you just think you're so highly of yourself.

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They know, of course I deserve this. I'm gonna go and show God that I care. And like, you're gonna just trick him into it.

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Exactly. Yeah, that's how I treated God too, like a butler, you know, before I was saved. And I thought

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I would, same, I would have said I was Christian, but I was not. Yeah, you treat him like a genie in the bottle.

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Right. You don't treat him as Lord and Savior. Yeah. All right, well, let's get into kind of your experience in Japan.

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I think it's really gonna be helpful for maybe missionaries. We just actually met a young man at church named

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Trenton who's gonna go to Japan within the next couple of months. He has a strong desire to go out there and preach the gospel and to evangelize.

15:00

But we know Japan is a very hard place to get the gospel into. I mean, Jessica and I, my wife, we had friends that were a missionary family there and had a church for 25 years, 25 years of faithful work, getting the gospel in.

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Only a couple, a handful of people in the church for the duration of the 25 years. So why do you think it's so difficult?

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What's so difficult about that nation and getting the gospel in? I would say most difficult is tradition.

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They're stuck in their ways. They know Shintoism is in the beginning of their lives. They offer up fruit and vegetables and different things to their

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God for blessings. And then as they move into the middle of their lives, they start going towards Buddhism because then it's reincarnation.

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So it's like, they're trying to rig the system. Like, I'm gonna borrow it from here. Kind of like what Jeff says sometimes, the foundation.

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It's like, I'm gonna stay on this foundation and then when I need to, I'm gonna go to that foundation. Another big thing is the ancestry.

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When you tell a Japanese person that you care for them and that they need

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Jesus and that if you come to Christ, you will have eternity in heaven, the first thing they're gonna say, what about my ancestors?

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And then you have to be truthful. Unless you're a bad person, you have to be truthful. You can't trick them into thinking, oh yeah, they're gonna come too.

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I remember sitting at a restaurant and some lady overhearing me and my interpreter talking. And she just said, wait a second,

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I have a question for you. If I believe in Jesus and I die, I go to heaven, but what about my ancestors?

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I said, well, do they believe in Jesus? And she said, no. I said, well, then the Bible says they're not in heaven, they're in hell.

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And she said, I can't believe in something like that. And it struck me,

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I didn't know what to say after that. It was like, well, you're gonna need to because you're not responsible for them, you're responsible for your own soul.

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And God, I pray that God changes your heart. But those are the two main things. The Christian church, when they first went over there, missionaries first went over there, they were blockaded.

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So what happened was, and this is pretty cool, is they went around, they went to Korea. And so now you see what

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God did in South Korea. And it's one of the most evangelized countries in the world. That's amazing.

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South Korea is sending missionaries to North America. I don't know if you guys knew that. No, I didn't know that. They're sending them to Japan, for sure.

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They should send them here too. All over. So it's really, it's hard to break into that culture.

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If you don't know the language, good luck. And if you don't have a platform, good luck. It's hard when people go over there and be like,

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I'm gonna be a missionary in Japan, and we've supported some. And then you start listening to what they're preaching.

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It's like, ah, I'm not down for that. I met one reformed pastor in Fukuoka that was through Jeff.

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We got hooked up through a guy in Hawaii. But it is very tough to go over there and think that you are gonna just walk into their culture and be fine.

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It's hard to get a job. It's hard to find places to live. It's expensive. You have to deal with a lot of other things.

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But the churches that I do know there, that I've gone to in spring training, and throughout the years, some of them are in guys' homes.

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The pastor has them in their homes. There's 10 people that go for the last 10 years. 10 people. I went to one in Miyazaki where the father was an alcoholic.

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He was angry at the world. He was working in the rice field one day, and someone had a radio on, and Billy Graham evangelism came on.

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He heard the gospel, got saved. He's led that church. It was him, now his son's the pastor.

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But they've had that church for over 50 years. Wow. And they got a bigger following.

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There's probably like 40, 45 people. But it's grown. Even in the 10 years I spent there, you've seen

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Christianity. My first year, you'd see some churches. Now there's churches everywhere. But the number one evangelizer there right now is the

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Mormon church. Oh, is that right? Yep, you see a lot of missionaries around. When Luke was there visiting, we saw some.

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And they go there. They're fluent in the language already. And they don't pull any punches.

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You know the Mormon church. They're not gonna mess around. So it's an evil. We need to stop it.

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There's a lot of Jehovah's Witness. So we need more Christians to go there. Oh yeah, absolutely. But they need to be biblically sound. They need to know the truth of the gospel.

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And it needs to be a foundation that you don't just start swaying with the culture, where you're like, oh no, that's okay.

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Or the favor stuff, like the word of faith stuff, like Joel Osteen. You gotta be really careful.

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Exactly. And success isn't about numbers. I mean, like you just said, the guy faithfully led the church for 50 years, and he's got 40.

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It's not about numbers. It's just about that faithful expression of shepherding the way that God would want you to.

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But man, the Mormons, I mean, of course, totally aberrant system of theology.

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It's a cult, but they're kicking the Protestant butt when it comes to going. Biblical evangelism is going and proclaiming, and that's exactly what they do on their bikes with their little white shirts and black ties.

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So we've gotta catch up to them, or we're gonna lose nations. You know what resonates probably the most with the

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Japanese? I would say, if I had to guess, I don't know, but the theology of the

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Mormon, of you can become a god, and you can have your own, that probably to them is like, because they're very materialistic.

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They see their covetous. They want something, and they just go after it. They see baseball players as these, like,

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I've literally shaken someone's hand and had them cry as I'm shaking their hand, and I'm just like,

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I am not that cool. If you only knew who I was. Yeah, I mean, I feel like that's the way it is in America, too.

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I mean, being a baseball player, that's probably the top goal of every little boy, not every, but lots of little boys and young men.

20:58

Sure. And, yeah. And parents. And parents. They want their kids to be rich. Exactly, yeah. And living, so it's all this sin of just coveting, right?

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Right, right. We see it, we want it, and so the Japanese are just like us here. I'm not saying that we're any better or more pious than them, but they really, that probably resonates with them more, is that aspect of it.

21:16

Oh, is that right? Yeah, so you, God gave you the gift to play baseball, gave you a special gift, and he brought you to Japan, and you say in your testimony that that was for the purpose of getting the gospel to the

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Japanese. So how did God use you and your platform there to get the gospel? Well, yeah, because, I mean, I was at the end of my career here.

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I literally had a surgery. I came back throwing puss. I mean, when

21:41

I say puss, I mean, 84. Talk about hitting off me, you'd have been able to hit off me. No, no way. And so I'm in spring training thinking, like, this is probably it.

21:49

I remember telling Jada a lot, like we had Kinsley at the time, like, Jada, this is, it's coming to an end, you know?

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And I remember pitching in a game, my arm popped, and all of a sudden I was throwing 100 again, and I was like, this is, whoa, whoa, what just happened?

22:03

The whole season goes by here in the States, and no one calls me up, and I'm doing unreal.

22:09

And all right, finally this team from Hiroshima calls me, my agent, and he's like, hey, you wanna go to Japan for a year?

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I was like, well, Jada, what do you think, you know? She's like, yeah, it'd be fun, you know, let's check it out. One year turned into 10, but you can see it, like,

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I went over there, I was good, I threw hard, I wasn't great, I wasn't, like, stood out, like, wow, look at this guy.

22:29

But I went over there with a desire to do better than what I did, and I just felt like I got better every year.

22:36

And so after the first year, after God saved me after that first year, the next year was the worst year ever.

22:42

Oh, really? I got hurt, Jada got sick, I went home for three weeks, lost my job as the closer at Hiroshima.

22:49

At the end of the year, they released me. So I got signed with Seibu, I go to Tokyo. Jada's like, if I get pregnant,

22:56

I'm not coming. Calls me in spring training, I'm pregnant, I'm not coming. I'm like, no way, like,

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I can't be apart from, you know, Kinsley and Farrah and you. I saw her for three weeks out of nine months.

23:07

Oh my goodness. And then I thought I was done again. And then the team, Fukuoka, calls, and I signed my first two -year deal, and then

23:15

I got another three -year deal, and I got another three -year, and it was just like, God just kept, here you go, you're coming back.

23:21

And every time the season was over, it was like, I'm probably done, I'm probably done. And the success

23:26

I have is truly, I know for a fact, God gave me that platform. Right. You know, 100%.

23:32

Yeah. So kinda talk to me, what did you do? Did you go to schools and preach the gospel, or you had a track?

23:38

So early on, so in 2014, you know, I'm there in Fukuoka. I finally have someone that holds me accountable in my faith,

23:46

Jason Sanders, my buddy, solid believer. He lives in Alabama. He takes me on my first missions trip, go home.

23:55

15 comes around, 2015, and he's like, hey, you're gonna start coming with me to these churches and to these schools.

24:01

And I'm like, really, I gotta go speak? You know, like, I'm a fairly new believer. I'm at Apologia now for one year, so I'm getting the gospel more than I was at the other church

24:12

I was at, right? I kinda knew more than what I did the previous year. So then

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I just, you know, would go. And it was really just sharing my story, and it was amazing how the

24:22

Japanese people just love to hear it. Like, I resonated with them because I was just like them. I wasn't, you know, besides baseball and the fame there, it was,

24:31

I struggle with the same things you struggle with. You know, I have the same issues that you have. I have anger issues, you know?

24:37

I have lustful issues, you know? And so all of these things that I was saying to them, they were like, wow, why is this guy saying these things?

24:44

You know, like, I'm probably thinking, oh, these people think I'm crazy just being like, because who's gonna spill their beans like that, right?

24:50

No other baseball player, I'm sure. No other baseball player. They just don't do that, yeah. So then I get into 2016, my buddy

24:56

Jason leaves the team. He gets traded over to Chiba. So now I'm alone again as a Christian, but now

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I'm stronger. Now my faith is getting stronger. You know, I have Jeff and the church here, you know, constantly feeding me.

25:08

Social media was great because I get to watch the sermons. And finally the school start calling me like, hey, we want you to come speak.

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And I'm like, oh, solo act, this is awesome. Wow. But here's the deal, you can't speak on God.

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You can't say anything about God or what you believe. And I said, okay, I said, can I talk about like virtues?

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Like, you know, the fruits of the spirit was what I was getting at. Like, oh yeah, please, please do that. So then I start talking about love and joy, contentment, all these things.

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And as my success got better, you know, as I broke the same record in 15, 16,

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I broke it again. 2017 started, I was going to schools. They were like, talk about whatever you want.

25:49

So now I'm like, who knows Jesus Christ? And you know, 800 kids, no one, no one raised their hand.

25:55

And you have your Psalm 27, right? And so when did you start putting that on your like signature?

26:02

I think I was just reading. I was following some Bible plan where, you know, you read and that came across me.

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And I was just like, man, this is pretty, this is pretty powerful. So I just put it on my signature and I was like,

26:14

I'll throw it on there. You know, I've seen people do that before. I'll just scribble it on there. Next thing you know, I got people wearing my jerseys with Psalm 28, seven on there.

26:22

And I just thought about for a minute, look at this gospel. Like if someone's like, what's this piece Psalm 28, seven, you know, they look it up and they get it.

26:30

And the Lord is my strength and my shield and you my heart trust is what it is. And so that automatically starts a question like, oh, well, what does this mean?

26:39

I would pray on the mound before I would pitch every game, no matter what the situation was, I'd kneel down, take off my hat and pray.

26:46

I just pray for normal, you know, God for protection. Let me honor you. And no matter what, all the glory is yours.

26:52

I don't care if I blew the game or save the game, it was the same outcome. And people would ask me, what do you say back there?

26:58

And I would tell them, they were like, that's it. You know, like they didn't understand, you know, that you were not like praying that you would do really well and strike everyone out.

27:07

Like, no, because if God wants it to happen, he knows what's going to happen already. I'm not going to trick God and be like, oh, today's going to be the day, you know?

27:14

And so that was huge. And then the schools were just like, speak on what you want.

27:20

And so now I'm going, yeah, let's do it. And so I was sharing more, the Psalm 28, seven got big, people started making jerseys with it on their own stuff.

27:29

And then Cy came to me with him and Marv made those baseball tracks, which were - It meant to bring one.

27:36

It was amazing. That really changed. That was a game changer. Because now I had a baseball card, which there, if you give someone a baseball card, it's like, oh my goodness.

27:46

Oh, really? And little things would come up. And I'm not really into the, where things happen.

27:52

It's like, oh, you know, like, oh, you did that. Something happened one day, I get to say this. Jade and I and the girls were about to leave

27:58

Japan. It was in 2019. I had the baseball tracks and we were about to ride our bikes to the park.

28:04

And she goes, oh, do you have any tracks? And I said, let me just grab some. And I just grabbed, I had a huge stack. And all I did is

28:09

I grabbed a stack off the top and we get to the park and we park our bikes. And all of a sudden these kids, it's filled with kids and parents.

28:18

Someone saw me, recognized me. All of a sudden, all of them come over to me.

28:24

I had just enough cards and tracks for everyone in that group. I mean, we can vouch for him.

28:29

You guys are some of our very best friends. Your wife's like one of my very best friends. You're not charismatic.

28:34

You guys are solidly reformed. But God does amazing, miraculous things. It was one of those things where I'm like,

28:40

God, really? You know, and it's like, I don't believe in those, like people say, oh, he's giving you a sign.

28:46

I just believe that it just worked out, right? But it's so cool to think like, wow, I had enough tracks for every one of the, like God wanted every one of those people to get a track.

28:55

Like old R .C. Sproul says, there's not one maverick molecule, right? Like he knew the amount of.

29:00

He does all things in conformity with the purpose of his will so he knew exactly what needed to happen that day. I mean, he just blessed your arm to where you would get more success to where they would be like, preach the gospel.

29:11

Which who in the world is allowed to do that? Did anybody else ever in baseball history do that other than you in Japan?

29:18

No. And so God gives you, you know, lines this all up. You get this prestigious award where now you're very respected there and just opens up this opportunity for the gospel to go forward.

29:32

So why? He can get all the glory. Sure. All of it for God. Yeah, it's not about me. Yeah, I mean, it's just amazing how he uses his people in all different ways.

29:40

You know what I mean? It's like, it's just so encouraging. Yeah, that's awesome. And sometimes, you know, you get like Jada, is this really worth it?

29:46

Like me on an off day when I only get one every once in a while and I'm gonna leave you and the girls and go talk at a school, is it worth it?

29:53

And then Luke said something one day. He's like, dude, you're gonna get to heaven one day and you're gonna see a bunch of Japanese people there.

29:59

And it's gonna be because what God used you for. You might not see the fruits of your work in the moment, but you're gonna, you're gonna,

30:06

God's using every one of them. And I left 20 ,000 baseball tracks there when I left this past summer. And I handed them out to missionaries that were gonna go to that reformed

30:14

Pastor Shin and he was gonna go hand them out. And he's gonna use it. He's gonna use it to bring people to his church. And it's like, if God's gonna use me for that, then by all means.

30:23

I'm like a walking billboard. Go ahead. Yeah, praise God. And that's the way that he does it. Like you just said, so God gets all the glory.

30:29

Not so we can tie it to a baseball celebrity who's saying, hey, you know, taking pictures with the kids in the park and look at them, look what

30:35

I'm doing. He's not gonna be honored in all of that. He's just, it's in the true gospel in the form of the tracks and then you're preaching and speaking at the schools that saves people.

30:46

You never know what happens to that individual, but when all said and done, it's gonna be look what God did and Jesus gets all the glory.

30:52

Amen. That's right. Yeah, that's it. Yeah, that's awesome. And then you had an injury. When did you get, when did your hip?

31:00

So 2018, I got hurt five games in and, you know, Jada would always be like, you better humble yourself, better humble yourself.

31:06

And you know, that came, you know, I was 30 going in to be 38. And it's like, man, I just got a three year extension.

31:12

They gave it almost 38 year old, a three year. What were they thinking? And it's just got, it was like two weeks after I signed that deal,

31:19

I blow out, I'm home. The rest of the year, 19, I go, I'm still hurt, home. And then

31:24

I just had my hip replaced. So it's like, God, I was there. I missed a lot of time with Jada and the girls.

31:30

Like you guys know how much, you know, they were here. I was separated and I'll never get that time back.

31:36

But then God was like, all right, you can go home. Go home. So that was a blessing. But also

31:41

I was actually talking to Liam, my son, about you because our sons obviously just love you and are like, he's just the coolest thing ever.

31:51

But we were talking about idolatry and how a lot of the times in America, especially, we will look at people that are very successful, athletes, actors, musicians, and went like that.

32:04

If I could just get there, that would be the best, that would be the best life

32:09

I could have, right? But when something happens and you get injured and all of a sudden you're done earlier than you expected, for somebody who's not built their life on the rock, that could completely devastate them.

32:24

You know, they've built their life on this thing, whether it's baseball or whatever.

32:30

And as soon as that's taken away from them, they are devastated. Yeah, you see a lot of athletes do that. You see a lot of celebrities do it.

32:36

Because they build their worth and their identity upon their own personal capabilities. And then, you know, as time goes on -

32:43

And they get divorced. They get done with their game and they get divorced. They don't feel relevant. Yeah.

32:49

You see it in Hollywood all the time. These actors sadly commit suicide because they've built their whole lives on this sinking sand, the thing that we think, oh, that would just be the pinnacle of existence is to be there, right?

33:04

Sure. But then God gave us you as an example and other people where they've built their life on the solid rock.

33:12

And so when something like that happens, you know, you're like, of course, you're a little bummed out. I'm sure there was a lot of emotions going on from just loving the game and, you know, having your life be around that for so long.

33:24

But when it was coming to an end, you're not like devastated. You're like, all right, what's next?

33:30

Yeah, I was at peace. Because you've got the Holy Spirit and the Lord is with you and you've built your life on the rock now and baseball isn't your

33:37

God. You know, that's not your reason for living. That doesn't give you your worth. For sure. God definitely used that for his glory, but that's not your solid rock foundation, you know?

33:50

Yeah, and I would never, like, you know, you always say, oh, I'll be a role model and all that. Like, how can we tell our kids, how can people that have kids tell them, you know, be like this person who's morally bankrupt, right?

34:03

I've said it before, I've posted some things, like I'm not gonna get my voting analysis and all these things from people who are morally bankrupt.

34:10

I have a foundation in Christ. Now, if you want your son, I'm not gonna take, like, look at me,

34:15

I'm gonna point to Christ and that's what I'm gonna use. But we have so many people that see that and it's like, you live up to this expectation of you're an athlete and you have all these things.

34:27

Well, that's gonna get taken away at some point. And I went through a little thing. It's like, my biggest thing that I miss is the adrenaline going into a game when it's on the line, it's my job.

34:36

When I saw Maury, my teammate, take my job and I was hurt and I couldn't do anything, I just had to watch games,

34:41

I was so pissed. I was so pissed because that's my job. But then over time,

34:47

God was just like, hey, it's all right, we're gonna do something else. Let's go get busy and do this. So that's the sad part with people that are celebrities, movie stars, athletes, is they get done, they lose their relevance, what they believe is relevant, and they either commit suicide, they're alcoholics, they get divorced, and then you see the moral decay.

35:08

And that's a non -believer. You don't see believers doing that.

35:14

Right, that's true. Where they're strong believers. I'm not talking about the regular believer. We all know that.

35:19

But I'm talking about where their foundation is Christ. Yeah, you're not talking about the false converts that we see.

35:25

I'm not gonna get divorced from Jada because I miss baseball. And I wanna be back in the game. And she's the best. Yeah, yeah.

35:32

But it's a good example. I was just gonna say, it's a good example for us all to know, because I feel like even as believers, our eyes always wanna go to the left and be like, if I only had this, if I was this successful, then people would think well of me, and then

35:50

I would be happy. But we have to make our treasure Jesus. It's in his performance that he's already accomplished, not in ours that give us our sense of identity and worth.

35:58

But let's talk a little bit about what you're doing now. But before that, Trenton's gonna go over to Japan.

36:04

And so just give Trenton a couple thoughts on how you think that he could be effective coming into the mission field there.

36:11

I would tell him the same thing I told foreign baseball players when they come over. Don't bring the

36:17

US with you. Don't think you're gonna change their culture. Don't think you're gonna go over there and start questioning, well, why do you guys do this?

36:25

Well, you should do it like this. You'll be gone. Like no one will, they'll shut you off and that's it.

36:30

Go over there with what you have, is the gospel, and go over there and meet people.

36:36

Learn the language. You have to learn the language. It's gonna be hard to talk. And because I can interpret something through, say, my interpreter about the gospel, and he's gonna say it, and it's not gonna come out the same way as if I have a

36:49

Japanese believer interpret it. He's gonna interpret it a totally different way. So you have to be able to learn the language and use the correct dialect and all that.

36:58

Don't give up. It's gonna be hard. Or you might have two people that you talk to, but talk to those two people.

37:04

You might go over there for three years, and God might put you in touch with one person, and that's what you are there for.

37:10

So you're not there to bring millions of people to Christ, unless God wants you to be there and do that.

37:16

But go there and just don't think numbers, like you said earlier. Just think, hey,

37:21

I'm gonna go there with the gospel, and God's gonna use it. And just like what Jeff says, gospel bombs. Just keep throwing them out there.

37:27

Awesome. We're just called to obedience. Just be obedient. No matter where we are. Good. We're praying for you,

37:33

Trenton. Hopefully that was helpful for you, man. Talk about Red State Reform for just a minute. What's going on with that, and what does that whole effort wanna accomplish?

37:43

Well, I love the whole aspect of Red State Reform. Let's just break it down.

37:49

So Red State Reform is the lobbyist group. We have projects, so Action for Life right now, which would be our main thing, right?

37:59

We're trying to abolish abortion. We wanna end this atrocity. We wanna get rid of it. And I always say this,

38:06

I made an analogy the other day. I said, if you have an apple orchard and you keep picking apples, it's like the equivalent of going to the mill, what you guys do, which

38:14

I love, every day, and save babies. But you're gonna have to keep doing it and doing it.

38:19

So we need to come into the field and plow all the trees and get them out. And how do you do that? There has to be a legislative side where you get rid of it and we get laws in there and we follow the law.

38:30

Arizona, we all know, SB 13 -3603, it's already a law, but no attorney general's upheld it, no governor.

38:37

They don't have no backbone, they have no balls. And so what we need to do is have guys like Walt Blackman represent and do the manly thing, the unpopular thing, but do it because that's what

38:49

God commands us to do. So Red State Reform is gonna take on the legislative side of all of this.

38:55

I'm working very close with Zach Lautenschlager, learning a lot from him, because I'm not a politician. I might run in 2022 for state representative, because I feel like Christians need to get into politics more.

39:08

We've given up that part of it, like, oh, we can't touch it because it's morally bad and you get sucked into that world.

39:15

And why can't you go into that world and bring the gospel and have a foundation where, no, this is what this was founded on.

39:21

Our constitution is founded on God's word alone. And let's live by it. And so I'm hoping that turns into something,

39:28

I don't know, I tell Jada, she thinks I'm crazy. She's like, okay, all right. But Red State Reform is gonna handle a lot of things.

39:34

So abortion's number one, but we're gonna use it, if there starts coming like some tyrannical stuff, like, you know, let's say a

39:40

Joe Biden national mass mandate. Well, you know, he's gonna go to governors and he's gonna say, enforce it.

39:46

If you have a Republican governor, well, let's not say Doocy, because he's not very good, but if you have a solid

39:52

Republican governor and he says, no, I'm not gonna do it, he's gonna go to mayors. And so now a local magistrate.

39:57

So now why is it so important the local magistrate listens to the people? And why is the church not engaging them?

40:03

Because of things like that. The president doesn't do nothing. You know, we know that the house and the Senate controls the laws and this and that, but the local magistrates are huge.

40:12

And we've already seen them point, you know, federal law is this. Well, California, Colorado says different on the pot, right?

40:19

Oh yeah. They've been smoking pot for years. And the federal, you know, they don't go in there and arrest people. Same thing with abortion.

40:26

Yeah, Roe v. Wade, first of all, isn't law. It's a false law. And the state has the right to do what's right.

40:32

And so we need states to start acting accordingly and have solid Christian men do their jobs.

40:38

Yeah, we're like, just pretend these babies are pot and you know, say no. Yeah, say no to the federal government.

40:44

That's what we gotta do, is we have to defy the federal government. People believe so erroneously that the federal government is a solution.

40:50

The feds are the problem. And the only thing that we can do, the thing that we have to do, is we have to exercise our state sovereignty and say, no, we're not killing babies.

41:01

Let the chips fall where they may. If they come in with the troops, which I doubt they would, if they come in, it's worth it.

41:08

I'll take a bullet, I'll die for babies. But we have to defy Roe. We have to defy the federal government and say, we're not gonna kill our babies in the states anymore.

41:15

If a state would only rise up to do that, and we're praying Arizona will. We're gonna introduce a - Indiana looks good right now.

41:21

It does. Yeah, Indiana looks good, Oklahoma looks good. There's a lot, Texas, Missouri. I mean, there's a lot of legislators reaching out saying they're ready for it.

41:30

So where can our listeners go to learn more? Is there a website? Takeactionforlife .org,

41:36

redstatereform .org. This is not just red state as Arizona. This is, we're across 16 states right now.

41:43

Another four or five states, we're trying to get bills written. But we have men across this country that are fighting for the unborn and willing to risk a lot.

41:54

South Carolina, Jonathan Hill, state representative there, they defunded Planned Parenthood in 2019, or in 18.

42:01

When a state defunds Planned Parenthood, the federal doesn't pay it because they match what the state does.

42:07

Oh, is that right? So now they had no funding in South Carolina from federal or the state. And it transferred over to 2019, and then we'll see how it did, or it was 19 and 20.

42:17

So we'll see what happens in 2021. Yeah, it's just Christian men got busy doing what they need to do. What we need to be doing.

42:22

Yeah, that's awesome, dude. We'll be praying for red state reform. We're excited. 2021 is gonna be wild.

42:29

So be praying for that effort. When we get things going, the enemy is not gonna want anything to do with that.

42:35

Yeah, and we talk a lot on the show about God uses his people. He uses the body everywhere.

42:41

So like you said, don't be afraid to get into politics. Yeah. Be that teacher that's telling your students about Christ or the mom or the dad or in your workplace.

42:52

So I just, it's a great example of like, God using his people all over the globe to do his work, to give him the glory, to bring people into the fold.

43:03

So anyways, it's super encouraging. Thank you for sharing all of that. Yeah, awesome.

43:08

Well, let's get into our next segment. What's in the news? That's gonna be a new segment. It's been a lot.

43:14

You guys ready for this? Yeah. All right, well, let's just talk a little bit about, you know, the elephant in the room, the election.

43:23

The GOP elephant or the donkey? Yeah, we'll see. So here's a question. Why are the news outlets so biased towards?

43:30

I mean, are we gonna go on conspiracy theories? Just, what do you think?

43:35

God haters, God hating people are gonna do what God hating people do.

43:42

And that's lie, steal, cheat, you know, deceive. So that would be my short answer.

43:49

I'm sure there's something more articulate than that. Do news outlets determine the outcome of an election? Because if you look on the news right now, he's won.

43:56

Yeah, it's over. I mean, Congress calling him and saying, you're gonna be the next president of the United States. I mean, so it seems like they have the power to determine what's happening here.

44:05

But I think what we're seeing is it's just massive, massive. We knew it would happen. Pressure towards Trump just to concede, right?

44:14

I mean, social media is, it's a gift of God. And we as Christians need to use media production, whatever it may be, for the ends of getting the gospel out.

44:25

But the enemy, of course, is using it for his own destruction. I think that's behind much of, unfortunately, the liberal media's attempt to fabricate things, to bias things, not to go off, not to have any type of integrity in their reporting.

44:39

And of course, that's painting with a broad brush there. I'm not saying that they're totally lacking of integrity.

44:46

But I guess the question is, why is it so liberal? I mean, I went to the Trump rally in June, and people were busting at the seams.

44:56

You couldn't even get up from your chair, and the church was Phoenix First Assembly, or not, yeah, Phoenix, yeah,

45:01

First Assembly. And people would just gobble up your seat if you went to the bathroom. There was that many people.

45:07

But then I go home and watch the news, and they're like, how can Trump answer the fact that nobody's here to support him?

45:13

And what they did is they took pictures of the whole arena when nobody was there. So it was just a total fabrication.

45:20

It's just lying about what's happening. Well, look at the whole denouncing. He didn't denounce white supremacy.

45:26

And all he's been doing is denouncing it. And they won't fact check anyone. They always let those people slide.

45:32

But anything against Trump, you can say whatever you want. We've seen Fox just sell their soul to mainstream media.

45:38

It's biased because they don't wanna get drugged through like everyone else. They don't wanna get the mob after them, and they wanna stay in the middle where they don't lose their job.

45:48

Now I feel like people are just trying to save their job. You're seeing high -profile people losing jobs, and they're like,

45:53

I don't wanna do that. I love my money and my stuff, and I don't wanna do that. So the media's a joke.

45:59

I hope Laura and Marcus Pittman and John Speed, all those guys, I hope it takes off. I hope it blows up.

46:05

Because what's going on right now is you're suppressing the voice of half the country.

46:12

You're suppressing 71 million people aren't racists and bigots because they voted for Trump. They just don't like the other side of socialism,

46:20

Marxism, and communism. We like our guns. We like our freedom of religion. And we like our freedoms in general.

46:27

And so you're seeing this play out where they're already talking about the mass mandate in January when he takes office.

46:34

What if it's gone by then? I know, this is coming from the party of science. There is no proof that those masks have worked.

46:40

There's no scientific evidence. There's no science that's showing us forecasting that the coronavirus is still gonna be as bad as it is now in January 2021.

46:52

I mean, there's nothing. And they're like, we're, I mean, it was flashing on the big screens during their concession, not their concession, their, is that, what's that called?

47:02

Concession is when you lose. Yeah, when you give up. Yeah, no, their acceptance of the - Acceptance of the poll that they were present from the media.

47:10

Yeah, and it's like, we believe, you voted in truth. You voted in science, like science.

47:17

But then you see Chuck Schumer out at a huge rally with no mask on, and yet he's screaming, wear a mask.

47:22

And it's like the hypocrisy in this whole thing. You have a million people out in the, like, oh, but they're wearing their masks. Yeah, but they're also shoulder to shoulder, face to face.

47:29

Do you think that mask that's 99 cents for a pack of 10 is saving them? No, it's all -

47:35

It's all hypocrisy. It's hypocrisy, it's a joke, it's been politicized. Yeah, but what the left has done, what the party's done, and they said that they would do it.

47:42

They said, we can't let this go to waste. They've weaponized it, and we don't know. I mean, hopefully this is all exposed.

47:49

I mean, I'm praying, God, because that's exactly what good men do is they expose evil. Ephesians 5 .11 says, do not partake in wicked deeds of darkness, but rather to expose them.

47:58

So I'm praying the truth comes out so justice can be done. We're supposed to be about doing justice, and that is exposing wickedness.

48:06

Because if we don't do that, it's just gonna only embolden the wicked. It's only gonna embolden them to do it.

48:13

And if they are allowed to fraudulently take over election, it renders elections in our country meaningless.

48:20

We don't go, we go from a republic democracy, right? We go from that to a tyrannical totalitarian state where it's just, okay, free elections, but if you wanna come in and fraudulently corrupt them towards whatever guy that you want to be in the place or however we're voting, then what happens to free elections?

48:42

What happens to our democracy? Mark Zuckerberg is paying in Delaware County in Pennsylvania, he is paying for the poll watch ballot counters salaries.

48:51

Yeah, I just read that. $100 million he gave. This is before the election even started. Everyone knew this, they were fighting it.

48:57

They tried to take it to court. So we have that going on. How is it, if they win this Senate race, this runoff, and if he ends up being the president,

49:04

Biden ends up being the president, and they win this Senate race in Georgia in January, this runoff, they will repeal the second amendment right away.

49:12

That'll be their first thing. They might pack the court. Then what they're gonna do, so elections are never fair again,

49:19

Philadelphia, you're a state. You can secede from Pennsylvania. You can be your own state. LA, you can be your own state.

49:25

Now you have all of these liberal cities becoming states, and now you outnumber.

49:30

Get rid of the electoral college. Now it's just popular vote. Now it's just, and it's just like, there's no more election ever.

49:37

It's gone. Then you just, you get what you get. Yeah, I mean, I think just after the last year of seeing the complete media bias for just even with coronavirus and since Trump's been running for reelection, it's just seeing how much the media manipulates the masses and seeing like even

49:57

YouTube and Facebook and all these social media, it's easy for the

50:02

Christian to be like, oh my gosh, this is it. We gotta just go hunker down. We gotta go.

50:07

Jesus, take me. Yeah, but this is the time when we need to rise up and fight.

50:13

We need, like you said, how did the liberals get so much control over the media?

50:21

Church backed up. We, yeah, the church backed up. We need to get in there. We need to go into the hard places.

50:26

We need to go into the highways and byways and into the culture and bring the light of the gospel into conflict with all this evil around us.

50:35

This is not the time for us to go climb into a cave and hide because it seems so overwhelming.

50:42

It does seem so overwhelming when you're like looking at the media and you're like, how in the world? I mean, it used to be, at least when

50:48

I was a kid, when we were kids, we're all about the same age, it's like you watch the news and even if they were biased, obviously we believe there's no neutrality, but they would at least have some level of professionalism where they wouldn't say how they really felt.

51:05

Now, they don't even pretend not to be biased. They are flat out biased, like calling

51:11

Trump names and it's just so clear. It's like they're not even hiding anymore.

51:17

So anyways, I'm just saying, you could look at that and just feel so completely overwhelmed to hide.

51:22

So what would you say to people, what would you say as a pastor to other Christians to not give up and what would you say just being, coming from your background of sports and having to fight and to keep your eye in the game, what can you tell people to give us some encouragement so we don't feel like calling under a table?

51:44

You wanna go first or I can go? Yeah, you go first. Okay, well, what do we do? What's the response? Well, people will tell you like using words like fighting or kind of military language, it's not nice, it's not the loving thing to do.

52:00

We should only be preaching the gospel, we shouldn't have our foot in politics because that's just like rearranging the seats on the

52:08

Titanic or polishing the Titanic, where that comes from. But that's just not the example of the church that doesn't jive well with the scriptures.

52:16

I mean, we're called to be salt and light, right? And that salt and light from the church has to permeate every aspect of everything that we are and everything in the culture.

52:27

Because if you don't have salt, that preservative element, if you don't have light into some place, what happens? It's compounded darkness, like the political realm.

52:35

If there's no Christians getting into politics, they're not running for state legislator positions, whatever it may be, mayor, governor, all the way up.

52:44

If they're not doing that, the darkness just compounds, right? There's no light, it's just, we wonder why our government system from state level to federal level is so corrupt, it's because there's no faithful Christians there.

52:57

And it's because the church has told them, don't do it, we're gonna get raptured up, we're just gonna be shot up out of our clothes with Christ, there's no need to do that.

53:05

So I think, yeah, we have to do it, it's a command. And here's a simple command, why should we do it?

53:10

Why should we fight for our liberties? Because Jesus calls us to love our neighbor. How can we love our kids and love our posterity and love our neighbors around if we allow their freedoms just to go, just run over?

53:23

We can't do it. So I think the biblical answer is we love our neighbor, we obey

53:30

Christ, we defy tyrants, and it's just what we've been commanded to do. And I think the athlete answer to that is very similar, is

53:41

Christian athletes can't give in to the culture and say, oh, I can't profess my

53:46

Christian faith because if I do, they're gonna call me a bigot, you racist, you homophobe, this and that.

53:54

LeBron James can go on and out and literally talk bad about Hong Kong and trying to get their democracy and their freedom from China, who has slaves, millions of slaves, of Christians too, and Muslims that they have in these camps, right?

54:09

And they won't denounce them, why? Well, because that's where their money is. And you have the whole entire NBA saying, well, this is what it is,

54:17

BLM. Let's be real, as Christians, we have the foundation where we can say black lives matter.

54:24

They matter in the 1 ,600 that gets slaughtered every day at the abortion mill.

54:29

They matter in inner cities where they're getting shot by each other in gangs. They matter, the police officer in Houston that got shot and killed, he mattered.

54:37

But we have the foundation to say, why do their lives matter? That whole movement is shot and the

54:43

NBA just took on that. And what it is is, as LeBron can say it, but if a Christian stands up and says,

54:48

I'm against this because my God says that this is an abomination, oh, and then you're just, you're done.

54:55

So our Christian athletes can't just say, oh, I'm just gonna put on the rainbow jersey.

55:00

I'm just gonna put on the BLM t -shirt and conform and just be like, I know I serve God over here, but I know on TV and when

55:09

I'm doing this, I have to. Now, it was very easy for my team, never, I got called. The team that I'm on now got calls from fans on Twitter because I said something about Megan Rapino and America and what she was, she was living in sin, she needed to repent and literally they were calling for me to get fired.

55:29

Like they called the team, you need to release him, fire him and my team was like, we know his heart, we know what he's speaking is because he believes it and we're gonna let him go.

55:38

And they never, I didn't say anything. I didn't say anything to the team, they just let it go. Here, if you try to speak up like Sam Coonrod with the

55:45

Giants, he wouldn't bow the knee, which good for him, right? And everyone's like, oh, it's not that big of a deal, just bow your knee.

55:52

Well, yeah, Nebuchadnezzar, it wasn't that big of a deal to those guys, you know, Neshak and they're sitting there like, no, we're not gonna do that.

56:00

And we're gonna defy the state, we're gonna defy it. And what happened was, so this is the inside story on that.

56:07

The MLB said, hey, we're not gonna make it mandatory. If you wanna wear a BLM t -shirt, go ahead and do it.

56:14

But if you don't, we're not gonna tell the reporters that we decided as a team not to do it.

56:20

So what did they do? They sold out their own players. Wow. So now if you're a believer and you're like, I can't wear that, you're gonna be the only one on the field not wearing it.

56:28

Who's gonna be watching? All them little reporters that can't wait for the next big story. To devour.

56:33

And next thing you know it, you're getting drugged through the mud and it's like. Wow. But it's worth it.

56:38

It is worth it. At the end of the day, it's worth it. But you're like, you know what? I'm not gonna give in to you. You can fire me, Mark Dewey, who has a podcast in the bullpen, it happened in the 90s with him with the

56:51

AIDS pandemic, like all that stuff. And he wouldn't wear the ribbon and he said it because of his faith and he got drugged through the mud and forced out of that city.

57:01

Is it worth it? Heck yeah, it is. It's worth it. And we have a train of Christian brothers and sisters and our

57:06

Christian forefathers of the past. I mean, that is the story of church persecution and church history.

57:14

It's this question, are you gonna be faithful to Christ or not? Are you gonna be faithful to what you know to be true about him and his word?

57:21

Are you gonna be obedient to his commands? Are you gonna give in to the pressure? I mean, that's the story of the

57:26

Scottish Covenanters. We wax long about them. I'm not gonna go on them too much. But it was like, no, I don't care if you drag me through the mud,

57:33

I don't care if you, they used to cut their chests open and take their hearts out and show it to the public as they were getting executed.

57:40

And they would stay faithful up until the very moment with people screaming, even to 13 and 14 year old kids, just say that the king is king over Christ up until the very last moment.

57:51

That's all you have to do, just say it. You don't even have to believe it, just say it. But look at the story of Job, right? Curse God and die, right?

57:59

It was just, it's all about, I mean, God is giving us tests in life and our allegiance to him is what's most important.

58:06

Peter says that our faith is like gold, it's precious to God. And it's really this life lived out, are we gonna give you glory?

58:14

Are we gonna hold fast and true to you first in spite of anything? And even if we're dragged through the mud, even if we're the only guy that's gonna stand like Kunrod, it's all worth it, it doesn't matter.

58:25

Even if it costs us our lives, we as Christians, we have to grasp a hold of that because we can become so inoculated and so used to the comfort here, used to the fleshly pleasures that we would rather go to them.

58:40

I think as things unfold, and if they unfold in increasing persecution, you're gonna see a mass exodus out of the church.

58:48

Could you imagine someone standing outside of church with a clipboard and a pencil and writing down your name and address and who's going in.

58:56

And at some point they're gonna say, you either claim Christ or you don't go to church.

59:01

We're gonna take your money, we're gonna take your houses. You know how many people, these churches around here in this Valley would be empty?

59:08

Oh yeah. You'd have no more seats. I mean, they've been empty because of coronavirus and they all closed their doors like cowards, but they would be empty.

59:15

Yeah. There's gonna be plenty of Christians that would be like, nope, I'm out. Yeah. And that's, go ahead.

59:20

I was gonna say, the thing that I get pumped up about is that I feel like all of this,

59:25

God uses to light a fire in his people though. And so you just see this momentum growing.

59:34

So I'm, as crazy as things are, I'm excited to see what God has in store with Walt Blackman.

59:40

Sure. It just seems like, okay, it's time to fight. Let's do this. Because you just see

59:46

God's people rising up and being like, no, we're not backing down. God will use this to put a fire into his people.

59:54

And it's exciting. It is. It's exciting it's gonna be. And it weeds out a lot too.

01:00:00

It shows you who the strong ones are and who are the ones that were faking it and putting this facade on and being a hypocrite.

01:00:08

We'll talk a little bit about that in a second, but it's a purifying word. Persecution is always purifying, which is good because it does, it weeds out the fakes.

01:00:15

So they can be challenged and the faithful Christians can evangelize them. It's just like, well, you're really operating like this.

01:00:21

Let's examine yourself to see if you're in the faith. We'll talk more about that. But that's what, that's the story of church history, especially again, the covenanters is, these are people who wanted to live in subservience to the state as much as they could.

01:00:34

We want peaceful lives. We understand that we do have authorities over us, that God has instituted these authorities.

01:00:41

I wanna be a peaceable citizen, but there's lines drawn that we simply cannot cross.

01:00:48

And when those lines are drawn and we're forced to do things like the state coming into the church and telling the church what the church needs to do, we rise up and say over our dead bodies, we simply cannot do this because we would defy, we would be disobedient, dishonor our

01:01:01

Christ, our King, who is the sovereign over us. But you saw that with the covenanters. I mean, they would come out and they'd be in their field meetings and there'd be like a dragoon who's an

01:01:11

English soldier going around and like trying to scare everybody with their horses. And the covenanters would say, hey, you better stop that horse from doing that or I'm gonna blow your head right off.

01:01:21

So as they increased their intensity, so did the church when they had to. So yeah, we're not just gonna back up and let you trample over our wives and daughters as they're sitting on the ground.

01:01:33

That's not happening. We can't let that happen. Well, and it's easy, like right now, we're just talking to our son about it because it's, for your kids,

01:01:41

I'm sure, they're probably like, what's going on? This guy's gonna be president now. What if that happens? And then it starts, not just kids, but adults too.

01:01:49

Pastor Jeff talked about it yesterday too. It's like, what if they start forced vaccinating?

01:01:56

What if this? What if they don't allow? What if, what if, what if, and we can start like getting really afraid and so our son starts doing that.

01:02:03

Well, what if this happens? And my husband, Don, just stopped and said, hey, we have God on our side.

01:02:10

We shouldn't be afraid. They should be afraid. Like Pastor Jeff said yesterday, quoting

01:02:15

Psalm, our God sits in the heavens and laughs and that's what we should be doing. We should be sitting back laughing because we have

01:02:22

God on our side. Like a belly laugh too. We can actually find real joy in this situation even though it seems out of control because we know

01:02:31

God ultimately wins. Dat post nil, right? It's gonna get better. Yeah, and that's exactly the story of church history.

01:02:39

They would. I mean, the ones that were faithful to the end, they took it as it comes and I can't, the odds that they face, we can't even imagine.

01:02:47

But the guys were cool. They were funny. They laughed, they loved life. Even in the midst of the persecution, we should have no reason not to be joyful right now.

01:02:56

We don't, of course it could increase and if it increases, so be it. We don't want that to happen.

01:03:02

Of course you don't want that to happen, but if it does, we can't have joy. We can't have hilarity like these covenanters did and live life to the fullest and love our wives and love our kids and make money and do what

01:03:12

God has commanded us to do. But that's gotta be the attitude we have, not just defeat us, roll over.

01:03:18

And the problem is is there's just so many churchmen saying, oh, if you do that, you're not being faithful to Christ.

01:03:26

It's this, I think Piper said that if he saw a guy killing his wife, that he wouldn't defend his wife.

01:03:34

Because he's a man, an image bearer of God. And I was, you're better than me because I'm killing that guy.

01:03:40

Well, I don't think he has any biblical ground to stand on. I think that's just a biblically unwarranted thing to say.

01:03:46

Because what you do is you'll use scriptures out of context without looking at all of the scriptures systematically and having all of them come to bear upon a single issue.

01:03:54

Of course, when Jesus is saying, turn the other cheek, he's not saying don't defend your wife when a guy's trying to kill her.

01:04:01

He's talking about shame there because they would slap you on the face to shame you for what you were doing.

01:04:07

And so Jesus is saying, hey, let them shame you all they want, it doesn't matter. Because your identity and your value doesn't come from their opinion of you.

01:04:17

So let them shame you all they want. If they're shaming me, they're gonna shame you. If they hate me, they're gonna hate you, so take that. It has no bearing on self -defense and defending your loved ones at all.

01:04:25

So I just think is, you know, these guys who have high profile positions of spiritual authority and spiritual influence really have to be careful about what they're saying.

01:04:37

Can you imagine telling thousands upon thousands, multiple millions of men, even in our nation, if your wife and children are being killed, don't run to their aid to defend them?

01:04:46

Well, we already have a bunch of cowards already. I mean, they would probably be like, yeah, that's about right, we don't need to do that. Yeah, and we use coward a lot, but that's not some slight on them.

01:04:54

That is the definition of a coward. To back away when the enemy's assaulting, to back away from defending people who need you, that is the epitome of cowardice.

01:05:04

Well, it's a good reminder that even these men that we highly esteem, like Piper. I highly esteem

01:05:09

John Piper. He's, his books and his book,

01:05:14

Don't Waste Your Life Changed My Life. Like, I mean, I've been so edified by his work, but he's got feet of clay.

01:05:20

And so we don't look to them, we look to Christ. Yeah, yeah, and eat the meat and spit out the bones.

01:05:25

That's a problem with, and I don't think this is necessarily something that he's engendered, like he wanted to be a celebrity.

01:05:31

But this is what happens when you celebritize Christian men, which you should never do. They were trying to worship the angels in the scriptures, and they're like, what are you doing?

01:05:40

You're talking about angels. One of them killed 195 ,000 men in a battle, and these guys were forbidding you from worshiping us.

01:05:49

So how could you possibly worship a guy? And what you do is you set them up to be something that they aren't. And they have holes all in them.

01:05:56

The best of men are the men at best. So we can't do that because what you do is that his word is, the word of the celebrity comes on par with scripture.

01:06:07

So if John Piper says, I can't defend my wife in my house when she's being raped, well, I can't do it. That's scary.

01:06:12

We can't let ourselves get into that type of man idolatry. All right, so let's move forward a little bit.

01:06:20

Just one more little question I have for you. I see a lot of pastors, I see a lot of spiritual figures that are saying, you know what, back down,

01:06:28

Trump. Concede, you've lost this fight. The best thing to do is to unite the nation.

01:06:34

It's about unity now. It's about healing now. Melania Trump, even his wife is pressuring him to concede.

01:06:43

George W. Bush told him, concede. Should he concede or should he not? Did George W.

01:06:49

Bush, should he have conceded when Al Gore in 2000? Mic drop on that one. Are you kidding me?

01:06:54

Like, so do you concede? Well, no, when there is as much evidence as they say they have, which none of us have seen it.

01:07:02

I'm sure they have some. I don't see Trump as being some idiot fool like he's gonna be made mockery of and they're gonna be like, oh, he didn't have anything.

01:07:08

He was just playing it. I don't think, the guy went and played golf on Sunday. That does not seem like a man that is scared or he's nervous.

01:07:15

He went and played golf and that's pretty, to me, that's the first sign of like, okay, he doesn't care. He's got something.

01:07:22

They have evidence. There's people coming forward all the time. People are turning a blind. So do you just quit? That'd be like the same thing.

01:07:27

Do you tell people just to quit when things get tough? You have a system that is set up to go until December to make sure that the election was fair and ran fairly.

01:07:38

So you let the system work for what it's supposed to work. Or the next time it happens to a

01:07:45

Democrat, they'd be like, oh, no, no, we're gonna challenge this. And then it's so, it's both, they said

01:07:51

Trump cheated in the 2016 election and they spent the next three years trying to prove it.

01:07:57

But here he is, he has to just, and it's not being unity, it's conformity. It's conformity. Don't be, we're gonna unite.

01:08:03

You're not gonna unite 71 million people who know what you are, Joe Biden. And there's no,

01:08:09

I don't need healing. Trump is not my king, Jesus is. I don't need healing from Trump.

01:08:14

What I'm gonna fight is against is the Marxist socialist agenda that they have. Oh yeah, that's what they're trying to push.

01:08:20

And that's all I care about. And other Marxism and communism in a totalitarian state, which the Democrats want, it is, it's conformity, it's subjugation.

01:08:27

The tyrant subjugates. So that's why it's just conform, just concede, do what you want.

01:08:33

But I think Ecclesiastes 8 .11 says this. Because the sentence against an evil deed is not executed quickly, therefore the hearts of the sons of men among them are given fully to do evil.

01:08:43

And so what we're saying is if there's fraudulent activity and people, a lot of people have been sending me a message, well, where's all the fraudulent activity?

01:08:50

Rudy Giuliani, he's his lawyer, 50 other lawyers are saying, look, these ballots weren't inspected by Republicans.

01:08:58

That's a massive red flag there. Because what do they do normally with mail -in ballots? It's a Republican looks at it, a

01:09:03

Democrat looks at it, they evaluate it and inspect it. If it's good and clean, they say, okay, it's obviously a

01:09:09

Democrat, a vote for the Democrat. If not, we'll put it up on the shelf. Why in the world did so many hundreds of thousands of ballots were not seen by Republicans?

01:09:19

Why did they not do that? It's just so crazy. So I'm saying, show us the ballots, show them the ballots. Let them inspect it.

01:09:25

Let's count them all. And they have to do that. Go back to your question, what does darkness have to do with light?

01:09:31

And we're not saying Republicans and Christianity is synonymous, like not all

01:09:36

Republicans are Christian. Democrats, I'm not gonna say they're all unbelievers.

01:09:43

I think there's some believers that vote Democratic that just probably don't read their Bible. But I think there's a lot of people that are false converts that vote

01:09:55

Democrat because they're not saved, obviously. So anyways, but why would we, what does light have to do with evil?

01:10:03

Like why would we have this false unity when there are this platform, the

01:10:09

Democratic platform advocates for child murder, for the destruction of the family unit, for socialism,

01:10:16

Marxism, the destruction of our nation. Why on earth would we wanna be unified with that?

01:10:22

There is nothing biblical that tells us that we have to have this false peace.

01:10:28

There is no peace. Yeah, Jesus said, I came not to bring, I was thinking about this last night. I came not to bring peace, I came to bring a sword.

01:10:34

And there's no neutrality, right? You're either with me or against me. So if you say that and you say, okay,

01:10:41

I'm with you, Jesus, but gay marriage really isn't that bad.

01:10:48

Abortion, it's not really a full baby yet. No, then you're like, no, there's no neutrality.

01:10:54

You're either with me or you're against me, pick your side. And Christians who vote Democratic are either don't understand what the

01:11:02

Democratic Party stands for and they're just like, I hate Trump, I'm gonna vote. Which I'm sure there's some of that.

01:11:07

I don't even know your - Hold that thought, we're gonna get into that real quick. It's okay though. Yeah, because I really wanna kind of drill down on this.

01:11:14

This is kind of the meat and potatoes of this whole segment because we just wanna take the gloves off.

01:11:20

And I just wanna share my heart of just about how devastated I felt seeing this unfold.

01:11:26

And then not only that, because I don't know how people voted, but looking at the pastors, so many pastors

01:11:32

I know within social media and just on networks and how they responded to it.

01:11:38

But let's get into the next segment. It's called questions that may get you punched in the face.

01:11:44

Did you name that? It's just my favorite. I'm proud of it. Yeah, and it's all about what you guys were just talking about.

01:11:51

But let me read you a Kamala Harris quote. Every time I hear her name, I always say

01:11:56

Kamala, Kamala, I can't help it. And if you are a professing Christian, somebody that loves, you profess

01:12:04

Christ, you wear the label Christian, you go to church and you vote a Democrat, you voted for Biden and Harris, this is the person that you voted for.

01:12:14

Listen to what she says. She says, as states around our nation continue to attack reproductive rights, especially abortion, that's exactly what we are doing.

01:12:23

We're trying to save babies. It's more important than ever we have a president who will defend and expand these rights.

01:12:30

As president, Joe Biden will codify the Roe v. Wade and protect the constitutional right to choose.

01:12:37

Okay, so I'm gonna read that unfiltered. She says this, as states around our nation continue to attack reproductive rights, especially child murder, it's more important than ever we have a president who will defend and expand the right to kill your baby, the right to murder your baby.

01:12:53

As president, Joe Biden will make into law because Roe v. Wade we know is not law, it's just a fictitious court opinion.

01:13:00

He will make into law Roe v. Wade and protect the constitutional right to choose murder.

01:13:07

So if you voted for him, that is on your head. You will be accountable for that because you put these people into position.

01:13:16

More babies are gonna die than ever if he gets into that place of leadership or if something bad happens to him and he dies, she's the next president.

01:13:27

Well, the whole platform promotes that. Sure. It's not just. Right, how can a faithful Christian vote

01:13:32

Democrat? That's my question. How can a faithful Christian vote Democrat because we've been sounding off about this and we've been challenged by many

01:13:39

Christians out there. How, I don't understand how it can happen. You're gonna stand before God and he's gonna ask you, what did you do to end this atrocity?

01:13:48

And you're gonna say, what? I didn't do anything, I voted Democrat. What did you do to save babies?

01:13:55

All you did is keep putting people into positions of power that wanted to kill babies. Even Kamala Harris, she was for against the saving babies if they were struggling, if they had a botched abortion, she was against giving them any kind of help or medical needs.

01:14:13

And it's like, that is just evil. And we have women telling that they want their little girls to grow up to be like her, let alone that she slept with and committed adultery to get in the positions that she was in.

01:14:25

So the moral bankruptcy that she is living in is a joke.

01:14:30

And it's like, we're gonna let her tell us how we should live? Well, she helped prosecute David Dalladin, right?

01:14:36

Yeah. So who's David Dalladin, you wanna explain that? He did all the undercover work for Planned Parenthood.

01:14:43

So he caught criminal activity, right? So he's like, here's all the proof.

01:14:48

And then he got prosecuted for it. You know, in 2015, when Planned Parenthood was selling baby body parts.

01:14:54

He actually is the sacrificial lamb for that because he knew that once they went to court, he was gonna have to give his deposition.

01:15:02

And then so now they had to shut up, there was no more questions and now it's his story. So he was at least gonna get it out.

01:15:07

They weren't gonna be, and he was gonna show all of his proof. So that's still going on now. So he's gonna be able to show all of his evidence, all of those videos.

01:15:16

And they're trying to, actually right now, Planned Parenthood is trying to stop the case. They're trying to say, no, we don't wanna do this no more.

01:15:21

And it's like, oh. Now you don't wanna. Oh, got you. But yeah, she's evil. And if you voted for them, you know what you voted for.

01:15:29

There's no way around it. Yeah, there's no way. It's on every ballot you voted for them. You saw the debates, you saw all of the things that they were trying to do.

01:15:38

They're against everything that God stand for. So there's no neutrality. Right, exactly. And you literally have to go like this, la, la, la, la, la to not,

01:15:47

I mean, I will tell somebody that's saying that they're Christian, okay, this is what, cause

01:15:53

I got some nasty texts this week from some of my old friends that are professing

01:16:00

Christians, voting Democrat. Anyways, I'm like, hey, they got this one old friend of mine.

01:16:07

She got real mad because Zach had posted something and I reposted it.

01:16:12

And all it said was, what was it? If you. Shame on professing

01:16:17

Christians who voted for Joe Biden. Yeah. Yeah, and that's so judgmental of you.

01:16:23

How could you shame other Christians? Voting Democrat, voting

01:16:29

Republican doesn't make you a Christian. All these things. No, nobody's saying. It's a straw man. Yeah, a straw man. And I just flat out said, okay, 1 .6

01:16:38

million children are gonna die this year because of abortion. That's one baby every two minutes is getting slaughtered.

01:16:47

That is what's happening. And that is what this man in this platform is promoting and wants to advance.

01:16:55

They wanna keep it going. Does that mean putting a Republican in is gonna end it?

01:17:00

Obviously not, it's been going on for 43 years since Roe v. Wade. So we know that the gospel is gonna end it, but it's gonna sure help if we don't have somebody that's advocating to keep pushing it forward.

01:17:14

So I said, no, this is what you're supporting when you do it. And she wrote, I am not gonna read that.

01:17:20

Yeah, it's just, that's what the members of the Pharisees and Sadducees when Jesus would speak, they would just scream and cover their ears.

01:17:27

They just don't wanna hear it. They don't wanna hear it. And that's a sign of the unbelievers. The Pharisees are liberals. Yeah, they were. That's what they do now, they're pride babies.

01:17:33

Yeah, they don't wanna hear it and they don't wanna be confronted or they'll start going, well, like you said, it's not really a baby yet or they'll go, well, we care about women and their rights and we care about the children at the border.

01:17:48

And they'll divert and just completely turn a blind eye to their neighbors who are being killed every two minutes.

01:17:56

So I just don't understand how you can faithfully follow Christ, read your

01:18:01

Bible, love God and love your neighbor and vote for a party or platform that's systematically killing them.

01:18:08

Sure, you can't do it. And that's what we're drilling down to right now. I talked to my UPS driver and he saw my

01:18:14

Trump sign and he says, I can't believe you have that. And I said, Reggie, why? He goes, because he's morally,

01:18:19

I can't just, he says some terrible things. And I said, but the other party is for murdering babies. And he says, well,

01:18:25

I'm a Christian. I don't think a man should tell a woman what to do with their body. I said, oh really? I said, do you like wearing the mask?

01:18:31

He's like, no, I hate it. I said, that's weird. You don't like wearing a mask when you go into the store? You don't think a man should tell another man what to put on their body?

01:18:38

I said, okay, well, you're a professing Christian that thinks it's okay. He's like, well, it's just, I don't think abortion's okay.

01:18:44

I just don't think it's okay for a man to tell a woman. And I said, so he's like, and he went through a story and his girlfriend ended up having one a long time ago.

01:18:53

And so I said, so you are a father, you had a baby and you let her kill it. And it's really strained the relationship now.

01:19:00

It's an awkward, we used to talk, Jada would go out and see him, hey Ray. And now it's been really weird.

01:19:07

But at least I got the truth out there and spoke my piece. That's what love is, just saying the hard things that need to be said.

01:19:14

Loving your neighbor is being honest. Yeah, that's absolutely right. And that's the most disconcerting thing for me as I was just watching this unfold.

01:19:22

And just leading up to the whole election is the reason why professing

01:19:28

Christians vote this way is because their pastors maybe inadvertently or advertently just they're getting their advice from their pastors.

01:19:36

They're saying Joe Biden is not our enemy. They're saying things like voting for Joe Biden is not a sin, which

01:19:44

I would absolutely challenge. This is a guy who represents a democratic party that's full of coveting, theft, taxation, of course, child murder, sexual sin, sexual gender confusion, it's just a built on sin.

01:19:58

And so what you got is you got this massive amount of people that voted this guy into the office, that profess

01:20:03

Christ that don't know, that don't know him. I mean, what's coming to the surface is just the massive populous, growing populous in our nation of people who profess

01:20:13

Christ who don't know God. You cannot tell me you know God to any degree when you vote a guy into office that does the things that he hates and affirms and celebrates the things that God hates.

01:20:26

That's not part and parcel with the regenerate heart. The regenerate heart given to the newborn

01:20:32

Christian, the born again Christian is a heart that loves the things that God loves. You guys know, you were there.

01:20:38

I didn't even think about abortion. I didn't care about God and his law. I wanna just live my life. I was God of me.

01:20:43

I'm gonna do what I want. Don't you dare tell me what to do. And then all of a sudden, just out of sovereign mercy and grace, you're gifted this heart and you're like, wait,

01:20:50

I hate sin. I love God's word. I love his people. I wanna be obedient to him. I wanna cast off sin.

01:20:55

I wanna put on righteousness. That is what regeneration amounts to. And so what do we have to do here?

01:21:02

We have to shame Christians. We have to say, this is wrong. We have to rebuke.

01:21:07

We have to wake them up with that terminology. So I did that post that said, shame on you. And so many

01:21:13

Christians came back at me and said, how dare you shame people? That comes from the devil and not God. Then I go to Colossians 2 .15,

01:21:19

where it says that Jesus put the authorities to open shame. The Bible commands us to rebuke.

01:21:25

Rebuking is strong correction. That's the role of a pastor. What I gotta do if I'm dutiful to my position.

01:21:31

As Christians, if I'm a Christian man and I'm out and I see another

01:21:37

Christian brother, not with his wife, do I just turn around and leave and hope that he didn't see me and then hold it in?

01:21:45

Or do you go to him privately and say, hey, listen, I know what's going on. I saw, you need to handle this.

01:21:51

Let's do it. No, you're like, yeah, of course that's what you do. And so now when you're talking about a party like the

01:21:56

Democratic Party, it's like, oh, just like whatever. Just live however you want. So Christians as Christians, like yeah, we should judge

01:22:03

Christians on your fruit and on your faith. If you let that go as a Christian, be like, well, wait a second, you're wrong right here.

01:22:10

Let's go back to the word. Let's see what God says. Yeah, you hate them if you don't do that. You're not faithful. You're not obedient.

01:22:15

I mean, we are called, the Bible says that open, we're called to openly rebuke, that the wise man accepts the rebuke.

01:22:21

I mean, if you saw a guy and he was out with another lady and you didn't go to him, you don't love him. No. Because you allow him to continue in this path of destruction that's gonna destroy him and destroy his wife.

01:22:32

No, so when we say these things, they seem negative to the unregenerate person, but they are very life -giving because they challenge you in your course.

01:22:43

I mean, these folks that are filling churches that are voting for a hellish couple people like these two individuals, devilish, just absolutely depraved, wicked people, that are gonna kill human beings.

01:22:55

For Christians to vote for that, and for us who are in the faith not to challenge them, we don't love them. Now, the right thing, what we need to do as Christians in this nation, and what

01:23:04

I'm gonna devote a lot of my heart to for the next, I don't know, forever, I guess, is really challenge the faith of Christians as much as we can.

01:23:11

How do we do it? I talked a little bit about it last night, maybe just a little bit of practical evangelistic advice, but when you share the gospel and people tell you, oh,

01:23:19

I'm a Christian, you can't take that at face value. Sometimes you wanna just do it, because you feel, okay,

01:23:24

I'm kind of off the hook, I can move on to somebody else. No, it's no longer, I'm a

01:23:30

Christian, you have to dig deep, and you have to say, okay, well, the Bible does talk about false conversion.

01:23:36

The Bible talks about false Christians all through 1 John. That's what 1 John is all about, is understanding what true regeneration is.

01:23:43

But when you talk to a person, they tell you he's a Christian, just say, hey, just let me know what the gospel is, share the gospel with me.

01:23:49

I talked to a guy last night, and he said, well, what I do is I say, I'm about to get run over by a car, and you have three minutes to tell me the gospel before I go into eternity, what is it?

01:23:58

If they cannot articulate the true gospel, I'm not talking about waxing eloquent about all of...

01:24:03

Sure. We're not expecting that, no. Just the basic fundamentals, who God is God, God is holy, man is sinful, you preach the law to them, which exposes sin, the work of Christ, his death, burial, and resurrection, and the command to repent.

01:24:18

Those are some essential components of the gospel. If they can't articulate that, and you say, hey, and I've said it so many times before, how can you be saved by a gospel that you don't even understand?

01:24:29

And then it's laying out the gospel. Somebody asked me, how do we evangelize these churches? Do we go out in front of the churches?

01:24:35

Well, in some cultist churches, I would love to go out and stand in front of Joel Osteen's church, or Benny Hinn's, or,

01:24:40

I mean, aberrant churches. We gotta make sure we're doing it right, we're not beating up the bride here. But it's just basically, everybody you talk to, you share the gospel with, you challenge their

01:24:49

Christianity, and that's how we're going to see these people come to the Lord, that's all. I always see how

01:24:55

Christians get uncomfortable when Jada and I start talking about things, and they might bring up, oh, yeah, this female pastor that I follow, and I'm just like, oh,

01:25:05

I guess 2 Timothy's not in your Bible, I guess? But you can see the uncomfortableness, so that going back to that, the average

01:25:12

Christian would be like, well, you can't ruin that guy's family, because that's gonna ruin his kids and his wife, and they're gonna get divorced.

01:25:19

So don't do that, just let it go. And it's like, well, that's not what we're called to do.

01:25:25

So we're commanded to do, our life is not our own, we've been bought with a price. We're slaves to the master

01:25:30

Christ. We don't choose what we do. We get our marching orders from him, and that's the way we gotta live out our faith.

01:25:37

And it's so destructive for the unbelievers to see as well. So they're looking at people that are calling themselves

01:25:44

Christians, and they're like, see, they're Christians, and they're saying it's okay. They're giving a hearty approval for this.

01:25:52

Christians ruin it a lot with atheists. What does this do? It ushers people into hell, is what it does, with us clapping behind them, saying, good job, you're sinning against a holy

01:26:03

God, and we're saying that that sin is okay. A sin that God finds abominable, is detestable.

01:26:12

We Christians are saying, it's okay. We're gonna applaud you and approve of that.

01:26:18

Yeah, so I would say to that Christian that says, it's okay. God says abortion is murder.

01:26:24

I think it's okay. God says homosexuality is abominable sin.

01:26:29

He cast down what, raining sulfur on a couple cities because of it. If you think that's okay, you don't know

01:26:36

God. Like Paul says in 2 Corinthians 13, five, you have to examine yourself to see if you are in the faith.

01:26:43

The most loving thing that you can do to a family member who professes Christ, says, oh, I pray to God, I pray for the will of God, and throws around spiritual language like that, but actually lives a duplicitous life to where they support the things that God hates.

01:26:56

You should point them to Isaiah 1. Exactly. Isaiah 1 that says, I reject all of your worship.

01:27:02

Don't ever worship me because you failed to defend the fatherless. You failed to do justice. So we have to be bold as Christians, and it's a difficult thing to do.

01:27:11

Des and I have had to do it with friends and family, but in an attitude of love and humility, we've got to confront them and say, no,

01:27:19

I can't pray with you. I can't be spiritually yoked with you. We have to talk about the big white elephant in this room that you're professing

01:27:29

Christ, and you're supporting a guy like Joe Biden. You're voting for a guy like Joe Biden. You profess

01:27:34

Christ. You congratulate, and you celebrate, and you're out in the streets with folks celebrating a guy like him who is the enemy of God, who wars against God in his glory, and you're gonna tell me you're a

01:27:49

Christian. Shame on you for that. Shame on you. Not shame on you as just an arrow through your heart, but let's wake up.

01:27:56

Let's talk about the gospel. Let's talk about the fact that you don't know God because the Bible says, out of the abundance of the mouth, the heart speaks.

01:28:02

The Bible says that if the good tree bears good fruit, the bad tree bears bad fruit. Christianity is not some nominal title or classification that you just put on to be cool with people, some certain segment of people in your life that are

01:28:14

Christians, but then the other part of your life, you're the non -Christian. That's not what it's all about.

01:28:21

We have to say these hard things because so much of the American Evangelical Church is on that day of judgment.

01:28:28

Oh, I'm a Christian. My pastor told me I was a Christian, or my family told me I was a Christian. He's gonna say, depart from me. I never knew you, you worker of iniquity.

01:28:35

The most loving thing we could do is confront the false brethren in the church with the gospel.

01:28:41

It's what we gotta do, man. It's, to me, the hardest because it's really dying to yourself and dying because you love these people.

01:28:48

I love our unbelieving family. I love our unbelieving friends. I wanna see them saved.

01:28:54

I remember saying that same crap. I remember that crap coming out of my mouth and this guy over here just gently took me through it, and he never backed down.

01:29:05

He never faltered, but he always just said, no, this is what

01:29:11

God's word says. You're either gonna go follow your own ways or you're gonna follow Christ, and I hope that you follow

01:29:17

Christ, and then God, in his timing and in his sovereignty, saved me and opened my eyes, but I remember that pride and feeling offended.

01:29:26

Let that love for your neighbor, that love for your family member, let it stir you to action to die, and even if they hate you for it, they absolutely hate you and are offended by you and they don't talk to you ever again or they threaten that, tell them because you'd rather go into eternity knowing that you loved them enough to tell them than not because we don't know.

01:29:50

We're not guaranteed tomorrow. We don't know when we're gonna... You hope that those family members or friends that have rejected

01:29:56

God, you still have that hope for them that they're gonna come to the Lord before the end, but we don't know the timing, and so we just gotta love them enough to have them spit in our face.

01:30:09

That's right. You know? You gotta die to self. You know, we just... You have to. It's hard. We want the approval of men.

01:30:14

We don't want the approval of our loved ones. Afraid to get those unfriends on Facebook. Yeah. You know, I've gotten to be where it's like, you know what, at least

01:30:22

I'm gonna be consistent so you know, because that's what I think Christianity like hurts sometimes when you see a

01:30:28

Christian being consistent in one area, and then over here, it's like, oh man.

01:30:34

So that's when the atheist points out, well, here's a Christian, and then you see the side where he's struggling. It's like, we have to be consistent on every avenue, and I just,

01:30:43

I think that's the big key is Christians need to be consistent in everything they do. Yeah, we're gonna sin.

01:30:49

We're not sinless, you know, but we're gonna sin and make mistakes, but own it. That's up to it, you know?

01:30:55

Imagine if you found out your loved one had cancer and they were gonna die, and there was an antidote for it, and they, you never told them, and just right at the very end, as they're dying, they find out that you knew the antidote, and you have to tell them,

01:31:16

I knew this whole time, but I didn't tell you because, you know, I thought you were gonna be mad at me for it. Imagine having to face your loved one in eternity, and we know it's

01:31:26

God's sovereign will. God draws his elect. He uses his people with the gospel. Imagine, though, having to look the person that you love in the face and be like,

01:31:35

I was too afraid that you were gonna be mad at me. Yeah. Yeah. I don't want that. It's just, I love myself more than I did you.

01:31:41

I loved comfort. Yeah, comfort. I love, I mean, confrontation's not the funnest thing. I think people have varying degrees of -

01:31:47

Jada thinks it's fun. Yeah, that's cool. For some reason. That's why she's one of my best friends. She's very much like you. Confrontation, it's like different realms.

01:31:54

Like, confrontation, I don't care about going out and confronting guys at the abortion, or whatever it is, but it's like family confrontation. That's the hardest.

01:31:59

That's the hardest, but it's something that we gotta get past. It's just the level of depth of self.

01:32:05

And I think as you do that, God blesses you with more boldness and more courage to go forward. I mean, look, if persecution pops out and spreads like wildfire, which it may,

01:32:14

I mean, I see that coming, and I'm not a doomsday. I don't like, I wanna be joyful. I just wanna get to work for the

01:32:21

Lord. If it happens, you know what happens? It purifies, again, it purifies the church. You're talking about consistency. When the covenanters went through all their persecution, it brought out just these incredible men and women.

01:32:32

You know, and the preaching there was unreal. The ministry there was unreal. That's why they wanted more of the word like Jeff was talking about last night, how they would flip over the dial for more of it.

01:32:42

It makes the church more pure and more as it should be. So that's what we have to look forward to through persecution.

01:32:48

So what do we do? We just remain faithful and consistent, yeah. So anyway, man, I think we'll wrap it up there.

01:32:55

I love you. I appreciate you. I appreciate your wisdom. It was awesome. Yeah, thank you for coming on. It was awesome. It's just a combo. It's dangerous.

01:33:01

Yeah, so thanks for watching today. I hope it was a blessing to you. If it was, share it, support us.

01:33:07

We need your help. And maybe just take something out of this. It's time to fight.

01:33:13

And what do we mean by fight? And the Bible says we don't wage war like out of the flesh, right?

01:33:18

We don't wage war carnally. We fight with the gospel. We get the gospel out. But we are in the state that we are in as a nation, that professing

01:33:27

Christians can vote in such a wicked man like Joe Biden, because the gospel is not taking root within the nation.

01:33:34

We need Christians to get out there, share the gospel. And I'm not talking about getting up on soap boxes.

01:33:39

That's needed and going on street corners. That's needed too. Not everybody's called to that. You have a sphere of influence, and vocationally, relationally, people that you rub shoulders with, you have to get the gospel to them.

01:33:51

That is what we have. That's the only answer. There's no plan B here. The answer is a permeation of the gospel in a nation.

01:33:58

It has the redeeming qualities to make the nation as God wants it to be, only through the gospel.

01:34:03

So please, if you're thinking about your kids and your posterity and generations down the line, if you care about them, you'll preach the gospel.

01:34:12

If you love Christ, you'll preach the gospel. If you want to see our nation fold, like so many people predict it's going to fold, then you'll keep your mouth shut as a

01:34:21

Christian. We can't do that. So let's get out there and preach the gospel while we still have breath, right? Absolutely. We love you guys.

01:34:26

We'll see you next time. And just as a reminder, go on to our Facebook, Instagram, give us a like and review.

01:34:32

Oh, and our podcast platforms. I can't talk.

01:34:39

Blah, blah, blah. Yeah, go on iTunes, give us a review, because that's going to help kind of expand our little bubble.

01:34:45

So thanks for everybody that does that. And yeah, keep fighting. Get in the game, Christian, because it's on now.

01:34:51

It is. Go preach the gospel and - Get provoked. That's right. Love you guys.